Negro Ironworkers of Louisiana, 1718-1900

Historian and journalist Marcus Christian reveals how African Americans were the true artists behind New Orleans' classic iron architecture.

When people think of New Orleans, they envision the complex ironwork of balcony railings in the French Quarter or the delicate lacelike gates of the city's cemeteries. It is the city's florid ironwork that gives New Orleans its unmatched, memorable beauty. But few people realize that most of this ironwork was created in the antebellum South—the golden...